Hi! I am Muralidhar Reddy Mallem, a graduate student in Chemical Engineering at South Dakota School of Mines and Technology. I always found the field of Chemical Engineering to be interesting, appealing and more challenging. I obtained my Bachelors degree in Chemical Engineering from Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, India. I joined the research group of Dr.Gilcrease in summer 2003. Presently I am working under the guidance of Dr. Patrick C Gilcrease and Dr.David Dixon on “Simultaneous Saccharification and Fermentation of Lignocelluosic biomass”.

The primary goal of this project is to recover maximum amount of Bioethanol from pretreated lignocellulosic biomass by Simultaneous Saccharification and Fermentation. Softwood is the substrate (biomass) which I am using for my research as it is abundantly available in this part of South Dakota. My summer research was primarily focused on improving the glucose recovery from pretreated softwood by Enzymatic Hydrolysis. Due to the increasing costs of fossil fuels and the environmental problems associated with these fuels there is every need for us to switch on to some alternative liquid fuels such as Bioethanol.

Schematic of a typical Bioethanol process